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The evolution of the nose: why is the human hooter so big?

IT’S an evolutionary mystery that’s literally as plain as the nose on your face. Why did our ancestors develop a prominent protruding nose when most primates have flat nasal openings?

A new study suggests that our unusual nose may simply be a by-product of other, more important changes in the structure of our face as our brains enlarged.

Takeshi Nishimura at Kyoto University, Japan, and his team modelled the flow of inhaled air through the nasal passages of humans, chimpanzees and macaques. It turns out that our noses, unlike those of other primates, are poor at warming or cooling air that goes to the lungs (PLoS Computational Biology, DOI: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1004807).

This article appeared in print under the headline “Why we have really big noses…”